Somali pirates have seized a Greek cargo vessel northeast of Seychelles, a Greek Coastal Guard spokesman said on Tuesday.
The Panamanian-flagged Navios Apollon bulk carrier, owned by a Greek company with 19 crew members on board, was hijacked in the Gulf of Aden off Somalia's coast on Monday.
The captain of the Navios Apollon is Greek, the remaining 18 sailors are Filipinos.
The vessel was sailing to India with fertilizer.
Earlier on Monday a British-flagged chemical tanker and its 26 crew was also seized in the Gulf of Aden.
"We have hijacked a ship with [a] British flag in the Gulf of Aden late yesterday," pirate commander Mohamed Shakir told the British newspaper The Times by phone, adding that the ship was captured "peacefully" and "no shots were fired and [there are] no casualties."
With these seizures, Somali pirates have scored a record number of attacks and hijackings for 2009.
As of December 22, attacks by Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden and the east coast of Somalia numbered 174, with 35 vessels hijacked and 587 crew taken hostage so far in 2009.
Worldwide there were 324 pirate attacks on commercial ships this year as of October 20, with 37 vessels hijacked and 639 hostages taken, according to the International Maritime Bureau's Piracy Reporting Center.
ATHENS, December 29 (RIA Novosti)
